MGEITF 2008: Highfield Predicts Bright Future For Online TV

Online archive shows will make up a fifth of all TV viewing within five years time, according to Ashley Highfield, speaking at the MediaGuardian Edinburgh International Television Festival (MGEITF).

Highfield, Project Kangaroo’s chief operating officer, claimed that archive content would make up half of all video-on-demand services in five years time.

Highfield, who previously fronted the development of BBC’s iPlayer, also predicted that on-demand will account for 40% of all TV viewing by 2013.

Speaking about the multi-broadcaster venture Project Kangaroo, he said the biggest challenge would be to “weave a journey” through its range of both catch-up and archive content.

Highfield said: “We want to take you from Life on Mars into the Sweeney, or use a cast member – say Stephen Fry in Blackadder – and help you find content you hadn’t thought of.”

Project Kangaroo is expected to include 10,000 hours of BBC, ITV and Channel 4 content when it launches early next year.

The video-on-demand service has had a number of set-backs recently, as The Competition Commission delayed publishing its findings into the project until mid-January 2009 (see Investigation Into Project Kangaroo Pushed Back To 2009).

Simon Nelson, controller of portfolio and multimedia at BBC Vision, said Kangaroo will need to offer a range of additional material, such as exclusive behind the scenes footage, in order for it to be successful and stop users going to pirate sites.

He said: “If you don’t do this, it won’t be found in an online environment, and it won’t be talked about on blogs. For every episode of every programme we do from now on, we’ll provide a web page and everything we do will be findable on Google.”

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